Today on the site, Dan Nadel has a brief interview with the cartoonist and musician Brian Chippendale, who will forever be associated with Fort Thunder. They mostly talk about his latest musical project, Black Pus:

Dan Nadel:I know that Lightning Bolt songs evolve out of long jams between you and Gibson, or at the very least from sending your respective parts back and forth. But there’s no “other” in Black Pus, so how do these songs take shape? I ask because they definitely have “shape.” Layers, lyrics, and beginnings and ends. But it’s all you, and it’s a lot of sound material. What’s the process on, for example, Total Eclipse? Walk me through it.

Brian Chippendale: Black Pus music generally comes from the same process as Lightning Bolt music does. I jam, but with myself. I record everything and generally have at least one good idea every time I play. A lot of times the songs appear during the act of playing fairly fleshed-out with a few different parts, generally by adding and subtracting complexity as I jam. Having the basic ability to craft songs through jamming seems like a skill that just comes after all the years of doing it. I also, when playing alone, try to play long enough or hard enough that I get lost in it so that surprises can happen. You sing funny interesting melodies when you are exhausted.

Also, Sean T. Collins has returned to the fold with the first of hopefully many reviews. First he looks at Sorry Kid, Katrina Salinder Clark’s unusual minicomic (for lack of a better word) which debuted at this year’s CAKE:

I’ll admit it: Sorry Kid caught my eye because it was the first comic I’d seen on display with a trigger warning. “Contains themes of family loss” read the sticker on the display copy on artist Katrina Silander Clark’s table at the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo a few weeks ago, if I’m remembering right. What grabbed me about this was the obvious empathy it entailed: Whatever Sorry Kid was about, it was raw enough that Clark didn’t want people vulnerable to that kind of pain exposed to it accidentally.

Sorry Kid folds out like a 22×17 broadsheet. When examined closely, it reveals itself to be two 11×17 pages, their surface murky with black xerox ink, joined together by sparkly rainbow-silver tape. This juxtaposition in its construction encapsulates the eight-page whole, which sees Clark alternate heartrending grappling with the overpowering grief of her father’s death and small welcome gestures in the direction of comfort.

Good news for London: Seiichi Hayashi will be there (or here, if you’re reading this there) in London next week to celebrate the launch of his new publication from Breakdown Press, shepherded and translated by TCJ-contributor (and so much more) Ryan Holmberg. The cover is below.

Also note these days is U.D.W.F.G. (underdarkweirdfantasyground), a six-month long project with the same five contributors to each issue, including the first new comics from Mat Brinkman to see print in a while. Also: Tetsunori Tawaraya, Miguel Angel Martin, Ratigher, Paolo Massagli.

Still elsewhere in this world, the notable links for the day comics The New York Times, a newspaper I love to read (Make all the snarky jokes you want about the Times, but it’s an awesome machine.), but which continues to publish comics news items only a Comics Buyer’s Guide fan could read. John Romita Jr! A Dick Tracy/Little Orphan Annie crossover! That is some weird, subterranean shit.

The East London Comic and Arts Festival (ELCAF) is now in its third year (but its first time at the Oval Space, which might explain the capacity difficulties). Organized by the good folk of Nobrow press – they of plush and colorful releases from artists such as Jesse Moynihan, Kyle Platts and Blexbolex – it aims to “showcase the plethora of talent in the comics and graphic art scene in London and the UK and also to bring something fresh to our locals by drawing talent from abroad to take part in the event.” On the evidence of last week’s show it was mission accomplished: the exhibition space was heaving. Bodies jostled against each other politely in the near tropical heat, fingering sweat fogged pamphlets, queueing for autographs from, amongst others, Seth and Chris Ware, both of whom gave talks later on in the day. The crowd were young, oft bearded and wearing some frankly baffling t-shirts, and if there’s a better advert for the vitality and vigor of the underground comics scene then I’ve never seen it. It was a heart-warming sight, only slightly tempered by the sheer amount of folk one had to squeeze past to get to the tables. But, hell, I’d sooner have a bit of mare because of overcrowding than a total downer due to lack of interest.

And the great caricaturist and cartoonist Drew Friedman is here with a short essay explaining how he chose his subjects for his upcoming book of portraits, Heroes of the Comics. Here’s a sample:

The series kicked off with the great comics artist Will Elder and evolved from there. Shortly after Will died, his son-in-law Gary contacted me and asked if I would create a portrait of Will as a gift for Will’s daughter, Gary’s wife Nancy. They were very pleased with the result, (which is included in the book), so I decided to create a companion piece, a portrait of Will’s long time collaborator, the brilliant creator of MAD, Harvey Kurtzman, who had been my instructor at the School of Visual Arts. I was happy with the portrait and a limited edition print was made, which quickly sold out. I felt I might be on to something and decided to paint portraits of all the original MAD comic book artists including Jack Davis, Wally Wood, and John Severin, and also planned to release them as prints. I then added all of the EC artists (I’m a lifelong EC fan), and I realized I had the possible makings of a book, The Legends of EC Comics. It soon became apparent that depicting only EC artists would be too limited, so I expanded the idea to portraits of Legendary Comic Book Artists, centering on the early pioneers of comic books, those who entered the field during the first twenty years of its existence (mid-1930s to mid-1950s), and were virtually responsible for inventing the medium.

And last but also least, some comics people are arguing about this article making the case for “more shit-talking” in comics. I don’t know the full context, so I am probably missing something important, but it seems to be burying a worthy and unexceptionable point (comics professionals should be openly self- and industry-critical) under a mountain of ego gratification and eye-roll-prompting boneheadedness, starting but not ending with the initial premise of “embracing [shit-talking] as a label” as if it was the same thing as the LGBT community reclaiming the word queer or something, as opposed to a distracting way to (inadvertently?) make your own arguments look pointlessly idiotic and not worth paying attention to. Again, the point that creators and industry figures should be willing to take and make intelligent critical comments seems inarguable; the question is whether you want the criticism to prompt positive change or whether you’d rather just enjoy starting a bunch of unproductive internet drama while stroking yourself. Maybe I’m misunderstanding what’s going on, but that way of framing things guarantees that I won’t be the only one to do so.

Richard Gehr is here with an obituary of New Yorker cartoonist Charles Barsotti.

Charles Barsotti – or “Charley,” as nearly everyone called him – was born September 28, 1933, in San Marcos, Texas. “Everything down there either had thorns on it or bit,” he said of his hometown when I interviewed him in January 2013, “and that includes the adults.” Howard, his father, sold furniture in San Antonio, where Charley was raised. His mother, the delightfully named Dicey Belle Branum, was a schoolteacher. Barsotti credited his hard-working parents with inspiring his own determined work ethic. “That, and fear,” he added.

Bell’s encounter with Dominique Goblet at Fumetto-Internationales Comix Festival in Switzerland gives insight to what Bell sees beneath the surface of her autobiographical work. Through lectures and conversations, Goblet unveils an autobiographical goal for Bell, an understanding that “there is no trueness,” in Goblet’s words, “just facts and the links that connect the facts.”

It gets to the heart of what Bell has done naturally in her autobiographical work before and strives to do more purposefully as she continues. Why does she challenge herself to these diaries when she also often mentions how dissatisfied she is by the prospect of doing them? What is she trying to attain by sharing these works that could easily function as private, daily exercises in cartooning of no interest to anyone else but the cartoonist? Is this part of Bell’s pursuit of a phantom called objective truth? Or is it her acknowledgement that we fashion our own truth, and her way of doing so is within panels on paper?

The Society of Illustrators is holding its Hall of Fame induction ceremony this weekend. Nice to see Ed Sorel and Al Jaffee on the list. Sorel is one of the all-time great illustrators, and one whose work is always worth a second and third look.

Sophie Yanow’s autobiographical series In Situ reveals an artist whose understanding and experience of art, philosophy, politics and daily life are all inextricably bound together. Her new book, War of Streets and Houses, is a fascinating study of protest, privilege, self-awareness and political frustration. It’s an eyewitness account of being part of the tuition strike at a Montreal university in 2011 as well as a meditation on what it means to protest, both on a personal and global level. It’s also a philosophical and historical examination of the history of counter-protest and counter-revolutionary actions on the part of governments. Indeed, the comic’s title refers to an infamous pamphlet written by a French officer named Marshal Thomas Bugeaud, whose co-opting of houses in Algiers proved to be a key strategy in defeating separatists in the 1840s.

Leah Wishnia has a strong, impassioned report of her disillusionment following a recent visit to a comics show at the Scott Eder Gallery in New York.

I don’t know if everyone will be able to read it, but David Heatley has a long post on his Facebook page making public his thoughts on his comics career, his relationship with and admiration for Chris Ware, and internet criticism.

Jack did not need to put that much detail into a piece like this. A few very simple lines would have given his inker Vince Colletta enough to go on. So why did Kirby pack so much detail into an image like this, using thousands of pencil lines to provide shading for the illustration, especially considering he worked under such crushing deadlines cranking out an average of three entire comic books a month? I suspect that Jack Kirby was very passionate about his work. I think he was a perfectionist, and I think he enjoyed illustrating a page like this. He was finding the image throughout the illustration process, experimenting, and interestingly that quest for perfection is similar to the journey Jack talks about in his directions for Stan Lee on this page: the “trail may lead to ends of infinity – but he can only redeem himself through this assignment.” And that’s what many artists do, yes they make a living if they are lucky plying their craft, but the process of creating imagery on a blank page can be an adventure into your own imagination and a great excuse to study history and art.

Like much of Chast’s work, Can’t We Talk is a formal triumph that at first glance looks somewhat a mess.The New Yorker‘s most stylistically experimental cartoonist, Chast draws single-panel cartoons and multipage nonfiction narratives for the magazine in addition to creating monumental lists, typologies, calendars, archaeologies, fake publications, and real children’s books. Chast rarely makes do with a single gag. Her cartoons are often mini-multiples. From the rocky collection of “little things” (“chent,” spak,” “kabe,” etc.) that comprised her first TNY cartoon, she has been the magazine’s preeminent underpromiser/overdeliverer. She also happens to be one of the magazine’s best writers, and the book gives her the space to expand on funny, anxious, and often infuriating things that happen in her cartoons when she wants to convey the full weight of the Chast clan’s considerable neurotic karma.

Quick, quick! Joe McCulloch is giving a guided tour of the most interesting sounding new comics in stores this week. His spotlight pick is the collection of Wally Wood’s Witzend, which really is an amazing object I’ve been spending a lot of time with myself over the last few weeks. A fascinating historical document, with lots of great comics, too.

I try not to link to podcasts I have not yet had the time to listen to, but here are several that I am guessing are worth it, based on past performance: Gil Roth talks to Seth. Dan Berry talks to Jason Shiga and John Martz & Dustin Harbin.

I wondered if you could, for the record, restate your response to the criticism of the Chicago symposium. I think your defense is important — do you worry about canonization and exclusion? It’s a function of any event that not everyone gets invited, but are the ramifications of such groupings of concern to you? It was, I think, the whiteness of the panel, omission of Hernandez Bros, and the idea that it was a conservative canon-making. And finally, what’s next?

About the whiteness of the conference (and it wasn’t entirely white, but largely so): I appreciated Keith Knight’s comments a lot, and I also appreciated, in the follow up, his thoughts on how diversity in the comics field is growing. The conference website (for which all of the editorial content was written by me) states that the conference “brings together 17 world-famous cartoonists whose work has defined contemporary comics.” That is a true statement, in my opinion, for everyone who was invited. But it doesn’t mean that I think they are the only cartoonists whose work has defined contemporary comics, by any means. It would have been fabulous to have more people up there, and more non-white faces up there. If I could have gotten the funding to pull off an even bigger conference and invite more people, I would have!! I asked people I knew, who I had worked with or interviewed or met before. It’s a pretty white crowd, but not intentionally so!

Elsewhere:

Kim Deitch aired some concerns about Alvin Buenaventura’s business practices over the weekend. It’s all on Facebook here, here and here.

Here’s something I’ve rarely seen: An English-language profile of the French cartoonist Gotlib.

And Craig Fischer is organizing a big panel for Heroes Con, and he’d like to tell you about. Link is here, and text is below:

Comics Regulation, Comics Censorship: Past and Present

For their 2014 mega-panel, cartoonist Ben Towle and writer Craig Fischer team up with a cadre of expert commentators to examine those moments when political and public outrage over the content of comic books disrupted the body politic. The panel begins with a discussion of the recent South Carolina Fun Home controversy, where legislators in the House of Representatives tried to reduce state funding to the College of Charleston as a penalty for using Alison Bechdel’s lesbian-themed graphic novel in a campus program. Present for the Fun Home discussion are Dr. Consuela Francis, a comics scholar and professor in the English Department at the College of Charleston, and Christopher Brook, the Legal Director of North Carolina’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Then we’ll reconsider one of the most controversial figures in comics history: Dr. Fredric Wertham, author of 1954’s Seduction of the Innocent (published 60 years ago) and outspoken critic of what he considered the negative effects of comics on children. We’ll be joined via video by Dr. Bart Beaty (the author of Fredric Wertham and the Critique of Mass Culture [2005]) and Dr. Carol Tilley (the author of an article about distortions in Wertham’s research) to chart the latest developments in “Wertham Studies.”

Finally, Craig will conduct a career-spanning interview with legendary industry figure Denis Kitchen. We’ll zero in on the censorship hassles Kitchen tackled as a publisher and distributor of underground comix, on his role in the founding of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund in 1986, and on his involvement in the CBLDF’s highest profile case, the arrest and conviction of artist Mike Diana for obscenity in 1994 (20 years ago!). Join us for a thought-provoking exchange of ideas…and for a cake decorated to look like the seal of the Comics Code Authority!